To Protect And Serve

Chapter 3

I woke the next morning to a pounding headache that was only emphasized by the pounding on my bedroom door. My mother's strident voice came through the thin door causing fresh bursts of agony to erupt in my head.

"Get your butt out of bed this instant. You're gonna be late for school." my brain translated the voice on the other side. I roused myself from the bed and tentatively put one foot on the floor.

"I'm getting up, Ma," I called back sleepily just to silent the pounding on the door. Her footsteps marched away and all that was left was the pounding in my head.

I doggedly pulled on some semi-clean clothes and headed for the bathroom. The cold water on my face helped the pain a little and helped my still sleepy brain to comprehend the clock. The pounding was almost forgotten in my mad rush to get out the door.

I staggered out the door, pulling my backpack over my right shoulder. The damp rain drizzled down on my brown hair, thoroughly matting it to my forehead. I walked towards the school bus stop. I didn't think I could manage the walk and I was desperate enough to risk the yellow "torture chamber."

The school bus rounded the corner almost on two wheels and I instantly regretted my choice. Driving the bus was a middle aged bald chimp, ironically named Harry. Harry was known as the worst tempered and worst bus driver around the school. I knew I would be lucky to make it out of this bus ride with just a few bruises.

The bus screeched to a stop and Harry turned his glazed eyes on me. He snarled at me to get on the bus and quit stalling. I carefully climbed the steps and managed to fall into a seat halfway to the back just before the bus leaped away from the curb.

Through a divine miracle, I arrived at school with only the headache to complain about. I somehow drifted in and out of classrooms all day. I dreaded the end of the day though. Soccer practice loomed on the horizon. The headache and the two jerks on the field were going to make life miserable.

While the other guys were gearing up in the locker room, I slipped into Coach's office. He greeted me with his normal glare.

"What do you want, Mancel?" he growled. Then he noticed my black eye. His expression noticeably softened. "What happened to your eye, kid?"

"I slipped and fell, Coach. Could I be excused from today's practice?" the lame excuse sounds stupid before it even comes out my mouth.

"I'm gonna give you a break this one time, Mancel. This is your one chance though. No more excused practices. If you try to skip any more practices, I'll have you shoving goal nets up and down the field for a week, understood?"

I nod and slipped out the door. As I head towards the locker room exit, Lucas' voice catches up with me. "Hey dork, I wanna talk to you." Without looking back, I sped up and slid through the locker room door.

I knew where I was going. I knew when I saw that old dude, Collin, cleanly take care of Vince and Lucas. That was something I needed to learn how to do. Clearly those two jerks weren't done with me and I needed to learn how to protect myself.

Collin's doorbell rang cheerfully as I pushed through the door. This time coming through the door, I saw the name "Eagle Strike Krav Maga" printed on the glass. The mats inside the gym were laid out and perfectly clean. Everything inside the gym shone of absolute perfection.

"Can I help you?" Collin appeared from the office in the back. "Oh it's you, kid. How's your head feeling?"

"I'm fine. Thank you, sir," I replied. He waved off the "sir" title.

"Naw, kid, don't call me sir. I left that behind in the military. You can just call me Collin."

"Alright, Collin," I said mustering up my courage. "I need you to teach me whatever you did to those guys yesterday. I need to be able to protect myself. I don't have much money, but I can clean stuff for you, run errands for you..."

Collin waved off my breathless explanation and motioned for me to follow him. He took me into his office and pointed to the couch.

"Listen, kid, I didn't set up this gym to just make money. I know that sounds lame and everything, but I've been around the world and I've seen a lot of things. There's a lot of bad people in this world and those people that don't know how to protect themselves will die. Trying to talk people out of hurting you or your family usually does not work. So my primary purpose here was to teach people how to protect themselves. I'm not going to ask you for money, but I do want you to work for me in exchange. How does 4 or 5 hours on Saturdays sound? I'll train you the other days of the week and you help me keep things ship shape around here on Saturday."

I nearly stammer my thanks and he waved it away. He stands up and extends a hand. I grip it and look up at him with a big smile. He's not much taller than me, but he carries himself with a self confidence that makes him seem like a veritable giant.

"Let's go into gym and we'll get you started," Collin said as he headed towards the door.

The first thing he did was start in on a program of calisthenics that leaves me gasping for breath and laying on the floor. Soccer had in no way prepared me for this type of torture. Collin's enthusiasm knew no bounds and he cheerfully did one armed pushups while encouraging me to "knock 'em out."

He pulled me to my feet after a small break and made me stand facing him. Carefully talking his way through the different postures, he showed me how to go from casual to ready to fight position. Then he told me to hold my fight position while he circled me.

'Stay facing me at all times, kid. I'm your current threat. Be aware to other threats, but I'm your immediate threat."

He continued circle me while I shifted to follow him. He stuck out his hand gave my shoulder a solid shove. I stumbled backwards a few steps before regaining my balance.

"What was that for," I complained.

"Your feet placement is wrong. Watch my feet. See how they're spread out to keep my center of gravity low. Imagine a right angle triangle with your feet in the two opposite corners. Your gravity is low and a punch or shove to your shoulders won't knock you off balance."

I adapted slowly to the intense training and before long a couple of the movements began to naturally become a part of me. An hour later, Collin called an end to the training session. He pulled me into his office and handed me an exercise sheet.

"This'll help you gain a little muscle everyday. It doesn't start out very hard, but it'll get harder every day. Follow it exactly and you'll be able to pack a little more into your punches."

"Thank you for all the help, Collin. Can I come back tomorrow?" I asked eagerly.

He nodded with a grin and sent me out the door towards home. Little did I know that the next 4 years of my life, I would be spending every week training in that gym.